Publication Order of Non-Fiction Books

Stella Rimington is one of the promising authors from the United Kingdom, who has written several well known books based on the mystery and thriller genres. She is also the former Director General of the MI5. Stella held this position between the years 1992 and 1996. Author Stella was in fact the first lady to hold this position at the MI5. She was also the first DG to have gotten her named publicized on her appointment. Author Stella was born on May 13, 1935, in London, England. She was called Stella Whitehouse at the time of her birth. Her family shifted to Essex in the year 1939 in order to avoid the dangers of living in London at the time of the Second World War. When Stella’s father received a job offer as a chief draughtsman in Barrow-in-Furness, the whole family shifted there. Stella joined the Crosslands Convent School. Later, her father got a better job in Derbyshire and therefore, the family had to shift to the Midlands. There, author Stella was enrolled into the Nottingham Girls High School. During most of the summer time of her secondary school, Stella remained in Paris to work as an au pair. In the year 1954, she joined the Edinburgh University and studied English. It was during this time that she came across her future husband named John Rimmington. Author Stella completed her degree in the year 1958 and then went on to study archive administration from the Liverpool University.

Soon after, she began working at the Record Office located in Worcester as an archivist. The marriage of Stella and John took place in the year 1963, after which shifted back to London. After taking a short break, Stella applied for a job at the Library of India Office. Author Stella also had to move to India for some time in the year 1965 after her husband was given a post in the British High Commission as a First Secretary. This was followed by a chance to work in MI5 for a period of two years. With hard work and dedication, Stella went on to extend her stay in the MI5 and eventually became the Director General after gaining years of experience. Stella has worked in all the departments of the agency, including counter-espionage, counterterrorism, and counter-subversion. After her retirement, she wrote her autobiography as well as nine mystery novels in the Liz Carlyle series. As of today, is in her eighties and still going great. She divides her time between her homes located in Norfolk and London. Author Stella was awarded with an Honorary Degree in the year 2009 of Social Science Doctorate from the Nottingham Trent University. This was given to her in recognition to her support for the openness in the working of secret service agencies. In 2011, Stella served as a chair of judges for the Man Booker Prize. However, she was criticized along with a few other members for laying focus on readability instead of literary quality.

The British author Stella Rimington has written a series called Liz Carlyle series, which consist of spy thriller novels with Liz Carlyle as the protagonist. Thirty-four-year-old the character of Liz Carlyle is an officer, who works in the counterterrorism division of MI5 intelligence. Since she is working for the Security service that is full male-dominated officers, she has made her way to the top through hard work and dedication. Liz Carlyle series by British author Stella Rimington began in 2004 and the first novel in the series is ‘At Risk’ and the novel was published by Vintage Crime/Black Lizard on 30th May of the year 2006. It is an ongoing series and every 1-2 years a new novel is published. The plot starts in Britain, where the country is targeted by a terrorist. And on top of that, he is traveling with a British Passport, which makes him “invisible”, making the matters worse. The situation seems impossible to locate the terrorist before it’s too late. Looking at the condition the case is given to British intelligence’s most resourceful counter agent, Liz Carlyle. She never faced such a challenge in her career before like the one she is facing now while trying to find this invisible. The task will require all her courage and intelligence along with her hard-won experience. Since the novel is written by someone who was already Britain’s highest-ranking spy in her own years, Stella Rimington provides us a story which contains material full of suspense right from the very beginning till the end. The East Anglia’s rural parts is the place where much of the story takes place and the plot is extremely realistic, captivating and a lot of cleverness and tension that keeps the readers at the edge of their seat.

The second novel in the Liz Carlyle series written by the British author Stella is titled ‘Secret Asset’ and was published by Knopf on June 19, 2007. With the success of At Risk, the first novel in the Liz Carlyle series, Stella Rimington has become a writer who is a top-notch. Liz Carlyle, officer of MI5 intelligence has been introduced to us by the author and she is described as ambitious and a very talented officer, who is ready to do anything possible to keep the country clean. In the second novel Secret Asset, the world is in high-stakes and high tension. When it comes to assessing people, Liz Carlyle has always been skilled. One of her agents finds out that at an Islamic bookshop, suspicious meetings are taking place. The agent reports this to Liz and she puts all her trust into her instinct and gut that there is something about to happen by the terrorists. Director of Counterterrorism Charles Wetherby, who is Liz’s boss also knows that Liz always does her homework correctly and her instinct is never wrong. So, he immediately starts finding out what’s happening in that place by putting a surveillance operation. Then suddenly Liz is taken off the case by Wetherby and Liz is surprised by this action. She is shocked when Wetherby tells her he has received information that in one of the British intelligence’s branches a mole, a secret asset has been planted. There will be immeasurable damage to the Service if this turns out to be true. While her colleagues are trying to stop the terrorist strike, officer Liz Carlyle is made in charge of finding the secret asset before it’s too late. As it was in At Risk, the first woman Director General of MI5, Stella gave her full knowledge and experience in Secret Asset. The thriller in this novel is heart-stopping and no one can be trusted, even in the intelligence.

With the latest book in the Gray Man series by Mark Greaney coming out soon, we wanted to make the very first book in the series our book of the month.

Greaney is an incredible author and if you love the "lone badass" type of books then you will LOVE the Court "Gray Man" Gentry series. Read more about it.

Featured Series

It might seem like overkill, but we're giving The Gray Man series our featured series of the month.

Honestly this is such a great series and we feel not enough people read it so we want to push it. Read more about The Gray Man series and seriously if you haven't read it - start! Amazing thrillers.

Featured Author

Mark Greaney is an incredibly talented author. Not only does he write the Gray Man series however he also writes various Jack Ryan novels. Many feel he is the best writer of them and he truly is a great author. We're happy to award our author of the month to Mark Greaney.

Did You Know…

Jack Reacher never needs a watch, as he always knows what time it is in his head. This has sometimes played both major and minor parts in many of the plots of the novels he features in.